


Commit Our Body to the Deep

by MarittheFlyingArrow



Series: Shadow Across Ridges Afterwards [4]
Category: Black Sails
Genre: Aftermath of Violence, Bible Quotes, Comfort/Angst, Imprisonment, M/M, Post-Finale, Storytelling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-05
Updated: 2018-04-05
Packaged: 2019-04-18 17:54:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,481
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14218554
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MarittheFlyingArrow/pseuds/MarittheFlyingArrow
Summary: This upon the plainI fix, and hail the monarch of the main;Then bathe his altars with the mingled goreOf victims vow’d, a ram, a bull, a boar;Thence swift re-sailing to my native shores,Due victims slay to all the ethereal powers.--Odyssey XXIII, Alexander Pope Translation, 1725





	Commit Our Body to the Deep

**Author's Note:**

> I'm terribly sorry that I mistook Pope's translation as Hobbes', and didn't find that error before updating. Corrected on 2018/04/08.

He sits alone in his quarter, without candle, without moonlight, doing nothing but breathe, breathing into darkness. He was good at being mute and motionless, acting exactly as a proper inmate should be, covered himself with resigned silence, so he could preserve his mind away from any kind of reclamation. Sometimes he almost forgot how to vocalize what had to be said, but he never forgot what he was holding, never forgot why he was waiting. Waiting for his odds, for occasion, for a chance to justify. Their unborn prospect. Any word from his beloveds. The bitter salty taste from James’ drowning soul. For the sake of waiting.

At least they left him alone with his own grief. That’s not something can be averted or reformed at anyone’s will so easily.  
Whilst pondering in composure, he is aware of the taut feeling within his body, muscles strained, contending against weary and disquiet. Time used to be tolerable, neither from the living quality in this place nor the self-restraint he had molded through all these years, but out of inevitability. He never believed in that for a briefest moment, no more than just learned to accept it in some way. Knowing that inevitability cannot be permanent, yet cannot do anything to bring about its end, that’s from whence the real torment begins. He’d comprehended that far too well.

The bellring of middle-watch shift, the worn bronzy sound on the top of watchtower, hovering in the dead of night, draws him back to reality, inducing him like a troubled phantom. If there were any god damn reason told him to keep down, right now they are nowhere to be found. Maybe he takes it as the sign he was unknowingly waiting for.

Once made up decisions, he never hesitated for even a second, as a hatch cannot be precluded from a long-term incubation, no matter how quiet the process has been. No sword and spear, he simply shields himself with the ragged wool blanket, glides off the bedside and walk out. With eyes already adapt to the dark and memories from daytime, he sneaks down through the hallway, cautiously not to step on the wrong boards, which would startle those who are adrift on the water of Lethe. The creaking footsteps in the midnight, the hiss of impending scourge still bide in their restless sleep.

It’s Mr. Gibson guarding the quarters on shift. Less than few weeks after been settled down in this plantation, he noticed that despite have no practical reason to do so, both the militias and inmates perform that guarding as ordinary. _An unpleasant yet necessary means for their safety_ , the master told him so, with a sympathetic look on his face. _No_ , he replied in a coldly-polite tone, _if you really want to be honest with me, you’d say that’s a prohibition in disguise. Sir._

When he’s climbing down from the raised floor by ladder, the grey-bearded guardian rises the lantern, right hand on the pistol, awaits his next movement.

He sets foot on the ground unruffled, paces into the dim yellow light and nods. “Goodnight, Mr. Gibson.”  
“Huh.” Gibson recognizes him right away, puts the lantern back on chair, yet still frowns at him with suspicion, “What’s problem up there? Someone gets ill or something?”

“No, tonight’s rather quiet, though I’m afraid it’s not the same for me. “he says with as most sincere,” I’ve been trying to get some sleep, it would probably be helpful if you can let me go take a walk?”

Gibson gazes at him for a moment, seems to be measuring the supposed line between dutiful and lenient. “All right then.” after a dry cough he says at last, “Don’t spend too long.”

__

__*_ _

__

He is out in front of their house, blending new daub by bare feet when he sights James, just finished his first terrain scouting with warchief’s men, coming toward him through the birch woods. Three days operation, without delay, as he arranged. Even so, it’s still the longest parting they had since they left the plantation behind. He casts off the red clay mess under his feet immediately and trots toward James, holds him back into his arms, doesn’t bother to care about the mud on his limbs. It’s not a very long hug, both them trying to deliver it as a most regular thing, not even exchange a word, but he can feel how James loosens with great relief, how hard the belted dagger and pistol press against him, how tight James grasps on his shoulder blade.

Not until they release each other does he notice the dark stains on James’ black shirt, which spread across his chest, and a fresh coppery smell of blood.

He cups James’ neck gently and looks him over, “Did you--”

“Not my blood, not from humans either.” James smirks bitterly, reaches into his coat and takes out a palm-leaf wrapped pack, opens it up a bit, let him see the ruddy flesh inside. “We encountered with this fellow alongside the southward creek. A feral one. That boy- Chitto or Chiki something-found it first, but we couldn’t use guns because the spot was still in earshot of St. John’s outpost. So chief and I putted up a trap, brought it down by bare hand and cut its throat on the riverbank.”

“Sounds like an outcome hard to prevent if you choose to live outside the fence. For this fellow, specifically.” he says, walking James back under their thatched roof,” And I’m quite sure that Chitto something boy is called Tshikili. Are you trying to test my pronunciation or you really forgot?”

“You remind me the names, I cook some nice dinner for you, that’s what makes good partners, right?”

“That’s just what an aged pair would do when they have a life together.” He can’t help but mocking back with a smile. Or long-married couple, he thinks, but the sharp sadness evoked by those words halts him from speaking them out.

James puts the weapon belt on the table, tilts his head a little whilst grinning contentedly, did not sense his abrupt silent, he hopes so. “I’m going for a scrub and fetch some water, you come? Seems you need a proper bath not less than me.”

__

__*_ _

__

After paced down off the carriage path, he walks beside the narrow shade of eastside wall, heading into the compacted-soil ground in remote corner, at where the disused blockhouse sets. From this site he can see the torchfire of lookout-points on the opposite side of farm, flickering above in the chilly air, marking a border out from the boundless void. All these things, the coldness of October nights, the wind whizzing through the gaps between boards, every stirring feeling lured out by that profound dark, enfold him in a most familiar way.

Since the very early parts of his memory, darkness has been at his side. No matter it was him rambling alone in the Elizabethan mansion at his family’s estate, discerning, nuzzling and caressing the shadows surrounded him before them were painted and framed again by the daylight; Or it was utilized by his father, intended to arouse fear and obedience in his so called “unruly” mind. When he didn’t conduct himself as a proper young lord under Hamilton’s roof, he would be locked up in his own bedroom, servants be forbidden to respond his words, and all the candles and firewood and papers, anything enabled him to read or write, removed. His father perceived it as a ban, a threat, a punishment, but he’d never shared that view in the first place. In those nights, he liked to curl up on the windowsill, covered himself behind brocade curtains, beheld the world which his father thought could be hidden away from him by a door. A world has long existed before Light, spirited, latent, and undefined. A world he knew he will fall deeply in love for.

Eventually, while he was enlightened up to be the gentleman he needed to be, devoted to every intercourse with his schoolmates, his peers, the guests in their drawing room, with Miranda, he came to realize that the covert relation he made with darkness, which reared him as a haven, a mentor, an entirely foreign state of knowing, is something so inconceivable, that he had always, and would still reside - not desolately though - in the realm of solitary.

That’s where James found him. That’s also where they lost each other. And this time, he’s tracing back there to find James again.

__

__*_ _

__

“When would you tell me about this?”

James mutters in a low voice, sounds like reflecting with that question more than requiring an actual answer from him. He is floating in the river water, whole body relaxed, doing exactly as the way James has taught him last time, feels the rough fingertips stroking back and forth on the old burn which spread across his left upper arm, as if trying to depict the cause from that poorly remained aftermath.

“That’s just what would happen when you took an impulsive move in case of emergency. You knew better than me of that kind of situation.”

“I figured that.” James pause awhile, scoops and sprinkles water over his torso tenderly.” But I don’t need a neat conclusion on that story, like you don’t need them in mine.”

He opens his eyes, looks up at James’ naked, freckled chest, reaches out and puts his hand on the pink tissue growing from the sabre-cut gash. A wound caused by brutal fight, which started from Captain Flint’s deceit, ended with a man’s skull smashed by desperate violence. For the stolen page of L’Urca’s schedule. He remembers lots of details in that story, vivid and suffocating- James’ hands trembled heavily after letting go of that cannonball; thick blood mixed with brine spreading across Walrus’ deck; how the crew’s hell-freezing silent burst into roaring ecstasy- despite he was not there, absent from that narrative made for his sake.

James holds breath under his palm, as if the wound is still unsealed, burning painfully by the touch of pure liquor, but both them don’t wince back even a little.

“There’s nothing virtuous involved in my story, either. “He says in a strangely tranquil mood, grabs on James’ shoulder to help himself standing back in the water,” Someone almost got killed for struggling in the remnant of life, with death lingering around after the hurricane isolated us in scarcity.”

James gazes at him with thoughtful expression, places a hand on his back and pushes him lightly toward the strand, “Tell me after meal.”

__

__*_ _

__

The blockhouse is a small two-floor masonry fort, loopholes all blinded up, merely a stone-made box overgrown with moss and weed. Before the plantation extended for larger cane fields, it used to be an outpost guarding in front the gate of old eastside wall. When the old wall was teared down, it was discharged from former duty simultaneously, then the overseers applied it as “resuming place”, to restrain those who were being unreasonable or simply failed to behave themselves. A prison inside prison to kept them from doing further harm, that’s what’s believed.

He walks up to the lone-standing cage, leans his ear against the wooden panel and listens attentively; if the other one managed to retain some rest, stripping that rest away is the least he wants.

But he hears it, as he concerned, unsettled clink of handcuffs’ chain, echoing within empty chamber.

“James.”

The clink stops. No respond.

“You still there?” he asks softly.

James makes a sound between a sigh and a short laughter. “Formally.” The chain clinks again, with rustling footsteps getting close to the door,” They didn’t find trouble when you came over?”

“It’s possible that Mr. Gibson decided to grant some favor on me. Or most likely he just didn’t alert to my actual intent.”

“Still irresistible as you were, aren’t you?”

He smiles at that teasing, sits down on the ground with his right side leaning against the door. “Whatever you say, my well-knit manners were effective enough to let me stay much longer with you, and no one would find trouble for that.”

By the door he can sense James slowly repeats his movement on the other side, somehow soothes the unnerving feel bothered him in earlier hours.

” I should’ve taken advantage of that chaos, filch the key without knowing and throw it out of the god-damn wall for everyone’s good.”

James chuckles, seems to be pleased by his thought- or by him, he can’t tell- although he doesn’t mean it as a witty joke, “That’s a truly regret. But I feel rather comfortable here without those fucking nosy watchdogs in sight.”

“Break a man’s nose is quite an apparent way to react on that knowledge.”

“No virtue in my act, I know, but as you said, it’s effective enough under certain circumstances.”

“You mean violence?”

“Outrage.”

He closes his eyes, nods without words.

They share that fierce quietude together.

 

“I lost it.”

“What’s it you lost?”

“The emperor’s notes. “James says hoarsely,” Burned out along with my ship, sunk into deep water.”

“How...” he trances in stunned for a moment,” it wasn’t dropped behind when you fled?”

“Miranda has kept it, all these years, on the shelf I made for her. I’ve never got up my courage to take even a glance on it, not until she gave it back to me. To stop me from destroying the fort.”

“She kept it for you.” He presses his cheek on the scratched panel, can’t help but echoing what he said.” She kept it.”

“She missed her husband, badly.”

Guilt has been less and less stricken with its every return, only if he’s capable to distinct it from sheer grief, “I believe she missed you, too.”

James doesn’t reply. Not want to, or can’t.

“The inscription- “he pauses,” -was written in your room. Remember?”

“No.” there is a hint of doubt at first, soon replaced by shock,” No! God, I didn’t even know it happened. When?”

“In the morning after we shared your bed. I was sitting on your desk, using your ink and quill while you were busy watching over the street. I talked to you- something about Plato's Cave or else, I can’t recall now-and found you didn’t hear a word I said. That’s why I had to physically distract you from the window.”

“I…” James seems to be drawn back into their memory, yet doesn’t puzzle by it, slowly but firmly he says,” I was considering. Trying to set a route for us, for new life, for …a practicable future.”

“Yes. You were doing what you would do, what you’re great at. You were doing what makes who you are.”

“Where’s the meaning in that if I couldn’t save you from your father by doing so. “

“You’re not the one to be blamed, “he refutes in a slightly-over dour tone, “we’ve been through that.”

” I couldn’t even fucking assure you to know.”

The quiver in James’ voice wrenched his heart. “Know about what?”

“To know, truly know, even before all the unforgiven sacrifices, the war I’ve committed myself to in your name- “

”-that I love you. I love you. Thomas.”

 

__*_ _

 

“The gales and pouring stopped on third night. The water, however, did not withdraw entirely until next Sunday. It was not as formidable as which was described in the flood narrative, seems unthreatening by appearance, but killing by degrees, quiet and insidious, soaked the wood, rotten the crops, brewed malaria, and many people died from the waters that had become bitter, both laborers and farmers. The only difference made between us was that we cremated the dead behind walls, and they buried their neighbors and kin in the land of their own.”

“Before another ship of newcomers arrived, every subsisted man had no choice but burden much longer shift, with much shorter supplies, even those who haven’t fully recovered from illness and mourning. They both resented it, for the hurricane, for hunger and toil, for their compulsion, for each other, felt wretched in themselves but not in the others. I saw that putridity underneath, infected every man within its influence, I felt it was consuming that place, and tried to seek some way through it, but I was also compelled to realize that it was not about reason, it was something refused to be solved or unraveled, thus cannot be pacified by any…sensible means radically. There was certainly going to be a rupture, but I cannot predict when, or how, or even where will it occur.”

“And that occurrence arose not long after. On a stifling hot day, under the light of high noon. I was digging trench at far end when I hear a horse’s whine across from the smoldering field. Someone startled the horse in careless, which happened occasionally so I didn’t regard it at once. That whining didn’t stop, however, and suddenly a crashing sound came from the same direction. There was no whistle from overseer, but the foreman and I deemed that horse probably bumped down the canecart so we ran over to assist anyway. “

“When we got there, as we thought, the cart was overset, untied canes scattered everywhere, Mr. Pryce-the overseer- moaning on the ground while his horse was still stomping nearby, and the other guard was too focus on beating poor young Keith, didn’t even notice other workers gathering around. That guard had some unbending bias against Keith, frequently picked on him by misread his clumsy as intentional. But this time was different. A few workers began to protest, but he didn’t stop, kicking even harder, couldn’t stop himself from the twisted urge affecting him underneath. Before anyone fetched other guards Keith would’ve been beaten to dead, so Lewis and the other foreman went up and clamped him away from behind. But when the other guards finally arrived, they thrusted both them down on regardless, assuming these two men were attacking that guard. “

  
“You can imagine that-rash, reckless treating would provoke what kind of fury between the inmates. They clamored, shouted, some of them, holding machetes and shovels in their hands, getting too close, and one of the guards-another inconsiderate mistake- raised the gun toward them.”

“The rupture was there. That’s the only thing I could think about at that moment. There was going to be a conflict now or then. A conflict that may could be held back before its actual breakout, but the enmity couldn’t, if any man harms the other ones in that process would only make it worse. Or that conflict would take over eventually, militias from other settlements would interrupt, suppressed it in a much more violent and unmerciful way. And I only had a few seconds to take the right action.”

“So I walk straight through the crowd, grabs the torch from one of the burning leaf-piles, heading back into the field trail and set all the remaining canes on fire.”

“When I stands in front of what I’ve done, waiting for the guards chasing up and put me down, I stare at the flame and thick smokes rising like dragon awaken from dirt and ashes, doesn’t even aware of that burning pain on my skin, it’s when I finally, after all these years, after all the regrets and anger and confusing, genuinely accept a simple and undeniable truth. That where the fear initially comes from. They're not fear for the crown, not for their past enemies, not for the savages, not even the rebellion. That what they truly fear is the wildness. The crude, unrefined nature. Have to live alone with your fear for that kind of nature. That they're fear for what shapes a human being.”

 

__*_ _

 

 _And the Lord said unto him, come you and all your house forsake into the ark; for you have I seen righteous before me in this generation._  
_Of every clean beast you shall take to you by sevens, the mind and the spirit;_  
_And of beasts that are not clean by two, the hand and the soul;_  
_Of fowls also of the air by sevens, the parent and the child; to keep seed alive upon the face of all the earth._  
_For yet seven days, and I will cause it to storm upon the earth forty days and forty nights;_  
_And every living object that I have met will I destroy from off the face of the earth._  
_And all flesh that moved upon the earth, both of fowl, and of cattle, and of beast, and of every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth, and every man,_  
_All in whose nostrils was the breath of living soul, of all that was in the dry land, died._  
_And he only remained alive, and they that were with him in the ark_.  
_And the Water prevailed upon the earth a hundred and fifty days._


End file.
